Papers in Journals such as The Lancet, Behaviour Research and Therapy and Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapy have in recent years relied entirely on psychometric tests completed by clients, with no independent assessment by an outside body using a ‘gold standard’ diagnostic interview. The sole use of psychometric tests is great for academic clinicians, research papers can be produced at pace and at little cost, securing places in academia. Conferences are dominated by their offerings but actually nothing is changing in the real world of clients.
The Lancet paper on the PACE trial on CBT for chronic fatigue syndrome [Sharpe et al (2015) Rehabilitative treatments for chronic fatigue syndrome Lancet Psychiatry, 2, 1067-1074] provides a great example of how to ‘muddy the waters’. The authors presented CBT as making a major contribution to the treatment of CFS. But Bakanuria (2017) [ Chronic fatigue syndrome prevalence is grossly overestimated using Oxford criteria compared to Centers for Disease Control (Fukuda) criteria in a U.S population study. Fatigue: Biomedicine, Health and Behavior, ps 1-15] has pointed out that the authors used the very loose Oxford criteria for CFS, requiring mild fatigue, but the incidence of CFS is ten times less if the Center for Disease Control (CDC) rigorous criteria are used. Thus Sharpe et al had not demonstrated the efficacy of CBT in a population who truly had CFS. In December last the Lancet published a paper by Clark et al on predictors of outcome in IAPT but again the dependent variable is of doubtful validity, changes on PHQ9 and GAD7 in a population whose diagnostic status is unknown. In fairness in the discussion Clark et al (2017) do note that it is a limitation of their study that they have relied on self-report measures but there is no acknowledgement that their findings are actually unreliable. Doubtless their conclusion that organisational factors effect delivery of an efficacious treatment is true, but this is stating the obvious, if a treatment is found to be efficacious in a randomised controlled trial, unless there is a careful mapping of key elements in the rct e.g reliable diagnosis, ‘gold standard’ assessment, fidelity measures, there will be an inadequate translation from research into routine practice.
My hope for the New Year is objective measures of outcome so that we can truly begin serving clients, now there is a novel idea.
Dr Mike Scott